Beyond proximity: the importance of green space useability to self-reported health

Access to parks and green spaces within residential neighbourhoods has been shown to be an important pathway to generating better physical and mental health for individuals and communities. Early research in this area often failed to identify specific attributes that contributed to reported health outcomes, with more recent research focused on exploring relationships between health outcomes and aspects of access and design. A mixed methods research project conducted in Perth, Western Australia examined the role that neighbourhood green space played in influencing residents' self-reported health status, and this paper identifies significant relationships found between perceptions of green space quality and self-reported health. It focuses on the factors that were found to be most positively associated with better health outcomes: proximity, retention, useability and visitation of neighbourhood green space.